The Gist
In addition to graphic changes made to this category star, the Hawx Ultra 115 S gets a completely new Mimic liner designed to start with a better anatomical shape but closely heat mold to a perfect shape match for the foot and shin. She's still stripped and ripped—right down to the bare essentials of what makes a ski boot great, testers maintain. They like the thin but well-shaped liner that provided just the right amount of padding for comfort without muting the connection of the foot and leg with the shell, and said that the boot and body felt morphed together into one cohesive performance unit! The lighter weight of its thin shell wall polyurethane construction appeals, but testers mainly praised that it skied race-boot strong without race-boot pain.
The Fit
Narrows should be narrow, that's our stand, and here's what testers said about the Hawx Ultra 115 S W's initial fit: Great for the true, narrow foot. Great, narrow, firm fit. Well-defined heel pocket. Good low-volume, snug, firm fit. Locked and loaded! Testers gave it such even fit scores, right down the narrow side of things, that the averages for five cards were the same as for fifteen. The team agreed there's a little bit of extra room in the toebox and at the calf and that's about it—evenly snug-side everywhere else. They all loved the spring-loaded flex feel, solidly in line with its 115 billing, but a couple mentioned that the calf fit was a bit tall and jabby against the back of the leg.
Performance
Extremely energetic was the consensus among testers, who enjoyed how the lively forward flex (powered by the thin shelled polyurethane cuff) loaded and released energy with every turn. Feedback levels were high—with testers saying that they could feel every ripple in the snow beneath them, perhaps to a fault, with a few testers saying the transmissive, high energy feel could get jittery at times. Power to the edge was immediate and unfaltering.
Cool Features
For those who find perfectly snug just a little too constrictive, cooking the shell via the Memory Fit customization feature is a slick way to open up a little bit of extra room everywhere without blowing out the fit. Aside from being able to modify the flex and forward lean with the Power Shift (which accounts for the "S" in the model name) mechanism on the rear cuff and make lateral stance changes with the on-board cuff adjustment, canted sole shims are available in 0.5- to 3.0-degree increments as an optional purchase. The new Mimic liner utilizes a thin layer of heat moldable material close to the foot contact layer to provide a fine-tuned fit, post oven cooking.
Kudos